Wireless communications have emerged to become a huge market as millions of people world-wide buy cellular handsets, subscribe to Personal Communications Services (PCS), and make calls on a daily basis. There are many competing technologies in the wireless communications field. Initially, cellular transmissions were made according to traditional analog radio frequency (RF) technology. But as wireless digital technology improved, it became clear that digital applications were far superior to that of analog. The three dominant wireless digital technologies existing today include Global System of Mobile communications (GSM), Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA), and Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA). Of these three digital wireless technologies, CDMA is gaining widespread popularity because of its many advantages.
Generally, CDMA offers greater signal quality, resulting in clearer calls. In addition, CDMA utilizes a spread-spectrum approach, which essentially entails spreading the signal out across a wider spectrum. Consequently, the overall power of the transmitted signal can be boosted without exceeding the FCC regulations in any one channel. This makes it ideal for deployment in dense urban areas where multi-pathing is an issue. In turn, this results in fewer dropped calls. Furthermore, CDMA technology is more power efficient, thereby prolonging the standby and active battery life. But one of the most attractive features of CDMA is that it offers a greater capacity for carrying signals. Basically, the airwaves are divided into a number of different frequency bands per Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regulations. A limited segment of the airwaves has been allocated by the FCC for cellular usage. Due to the huge demand for cellular usage and the limited bandwidth that is available, getting a license from the FCC to transmit on a particular frequency band is extremely expensive. By increasing capacity, CDMA enables PCS providers to carry more users per channel. This increased capacity directly translates into greater revenue for cellular companies.
The advantages of CDMA carry over into high-speed wireless digital access. Increasingly, wireless digital applications are being used to access digital data (e.g., the Internet, intranet, multimedia, business data, etc.) at high speeds. With high speed wireless access, mobile users can obtain instant access to the Internet, business data (e.g., stock market quotes, sales reports, inventory information, price checks, customer data, emails, pages, etc.), and other real time data (e.g., traffic updates, weather information, sports news, etc.). The goal is to provide cellular handsets, personal digital assistants, portable communications devices, etc. the ability to transmit and receive digital data as well as make conventional telephone calls. The trend is towards ever faster mobile data speeds to meet customer demands. With greater data speeds, it is possible to provide even more data to more users. Recent CDMA based standards such as IS-95 and 3G are proposing increased data rates and capabilities. Other emerging standards include IEEE 802.11(b) which utilizes a direct sequence spread spectrum technique and “Bluetooth” which utilizes a frequency hopping spread spectrum technique.
Unfortunately, spreading the signal out across a wide spectrum subjects that signal to a greater degree of interfering signals found within that spectrum. Whereas digital filters can be used to effectively notch out all the known, fixed interference being broadcast in designated restricted bands, it is virtually impossible to accurately quantify and then effectively notch out each of the huge host of variable interfering signals in the various non-restricted bands. The aggregate effect from all of the various interference sources dramatically reduces the range of a spread spectrum signal. Furthermore, the interference significantly reduces the rate by which data can be transmitted using a spread spectrum technique.
Thus, there is a need in the prior art for a method or apparatus which could somehow eliminate most if not all of the interference so as to effectively increase the range and rate by which spread spectrum signals may be transmitted and received.